Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Sal — Thu, 15 May 2008 09:00:47 GMT

Let me be the first to commnt on this new blog...your summer outlook is exactly what a summer lover wants to hear...warmer and drier than normal. That the kind of stuff someone like myself waits all winter for. And Jim, I'm glad you added your "fine print" comment because it's important to remember that percentages can be a bit tricky. But in this case, the percentages seem to be in our corner.
Now if you thin this warm pattern will kick into high gear in June, that means we're going to have to turn things around quite quickly as it seems we will remain below normal for the next week or so, which takes us to the Memorial Day Weekend. Does your crystal ball show that pattern change as we approach June?
As always thanks for doing such a great job on both short and long range forecasts.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Jim Teske — Thu, 15 May 2008 11:03:26 GMT

Sal,

I just commented on the pattern into next week on my previous blog. Slide over there for a couple of minutes to check it out.

An additional comment to everyone about the 'fine print.' I didn't post it to give us an easy out if the forecast turns out wrong. It is to show that ,like any other forecast, there is a certain amount of uncertainty. In this case, I can give you a hard number to back up this uncertainty.

Jim

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Dan in Cicero — Thu, 15 May 2008 14:15:12 GMT

I don't mind warm and dry, but I worry about our already over-burdened infrastructure being able to keep up during the summer; specifically, electricity and water.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

kathy — Thu, 15 May 2008 14:20:47 GMT

Bring on summer! Those of us with pools will be happy to get more use out of them!

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Tom — Thu, 15 May 2008 16:12:18 GMT

Jim,

I noticed you go back 12 years for your "averages". Any reason for that number rather than the usual 30 years for weather averages?

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Jim Teske — Fri, 16 May 2008 11:17:22 GMT

Tom,

I'm not sure but I think you may be confused about the 12 years that had little snow in April. It's not a 12 year average but 12 specifc years that we used to make the summer forecast. These years had .1" or less. They included:

1949, 1951,1952,1953,1955,1959,1968,1969,1984,1998,1999,2005

Jim

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Rachel from Oneida County — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:55:45 GMT

I don't mind it being warm or dry but will be having another serious drought? If we are then I don't like the heat & dryness! If we aren't in danger of having a drought I think I'll be much much happier! I guess we'll just have to wait & see ~

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Paul — Fri, 16 May 2008 20:19:16 GMT

How come Accuweathers Prediction is the complete opposite of what Channel 9 said. Here is the link. Could you please explain. Also, they are not using data from the past winters and spring to come up with there forcasts but the Euro Model which is very accurate.

http://www.accuweather.com/mt-news-blogs.asp?partner=accuweather&blog=Anderson&pgurl=/mtweb/content/Anderson/archives/2008/05/updated_summer_monthly_forecast.asp

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Looking for snow — Sat, 17 May 2008 14:33:30 GMT

That link is pretty much a summer outlook for canada only and accuweather has to be the worse weather site on the net they are hardly ever right with things.

BTW screw summer bring on winter again.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Jim Teske — Sat, 17 May 2008 20:21:26 GMT

Paul,

Actually you did an excellent job of explaining the differences in how the two summer forecasts were different. I can't really add anything esle to that.

However, I did do a little research on the European seasonal and monthly forecasts and the way they do it is kind of neat. Instead of depending on the just the changes going on in the atmosphere the model factors in changes in the sea surface temperatures as well. We know that these changes are key in longer range forecasts (ie El Nino, La Ninas etc.). Certainly the European model has a good track record in the medium range (ie 6-10 day range) but I think it may be a bit early to claim these monthly and seasonal forecasts are accurate. I could not find anything in the Accu-Weather blog or the ECMWF web page to verify any past seasonal forecasts. Still it could be an exciting tool to use in the future.

One last note, I'm going to try and anticipate one future question: How does a cooler than normal May figure into our Summer forecast? It looks like it may not have much of an impact. For example, in the years that followed a lack of snow in April the Mays were split almost down the middle with 5 Above normal in temperature 4 below normal and the rest near normal.

Jim

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

bluedevilsccr — Sun, 18 May 2008 15:31:40 GMT

any word yet about the possible tornado last night in the sylvan beach area?? i know some places have been saying it hit the camden area, but when i saw the radar last night camden wasn't even getting hit by rain or anything and it was a lot farther south.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Jim Teske — Sun, 18 May 2008 17:21:49 GMT

bluedevilsccr,

No report back from the National Weather Service as of early Sunday afternoon. I think they were going to survey damage from the Camden storm but they may not investigate the Sylvan Beach storm. I would check their web site out of Binghamton later in the day for any reports:

http://www.erh.noaa.gov/er/bgm/

Also, here is the most complete report so far out on the web:

http://www.uticaod.com/news/x1874996427/Weather-team-head-to-Camden-Sunday

Jim

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Michael B — Sun, 18 May 2008 22:52:06 GMT

WSYR9 is forecasting a maximum temperature tomorrow of 49 degrees. The normal high is 70 degrees. That is a staggering 21 degrees below normal! Outrageous! No wonder Central New York has the 5th worst weather in the U.S.
One small consolation:Believe it or not it has been colder than that in late May-
40 degrees on 5/24/24.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Jim Teske — Mon, 19 May 2008 01:18:09 GMT

Here is the official report on the Camden storm. It was a tornado:

http://www.crh.noaa.gov/product.php?site=BGM&issuedby=BGM&product=LSR&format=txt&version=1&glossary=0

Michael B,

I'm curious, who ranked higher than Syracuse?

Jim

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Justin — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:33:37 GMT

Any connection with cold Mays and the following summer months?

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Bonnie — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:02:48 GMT

Justin: Jim answered that question up above already. It is pretty discouraging. I was swimming in the pool this time last year! Looks like it's going to be at least 2-3 weeks yet.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

Michael B — Mon, 19 May 2008 13:10:32 GMT

There was something about places with the worst weather in the newspaper but it was several years ago. I do not remember who did the survey.

re: Teske's Tidbits (5/14/08) The One About The Summer Forecast

bluedevilsccr — Tue, 20 May 2008 10:43:49 GMT

jim, just wondering, how bad is it that there was a tornado and no warning or anything was given at the time, not even after the reports of it? i know its uncommon to have a tornado, especially up in camden, but they did obviously had one but nothing was really done at the time.